John Steiner: Proposal for an Independent Primary

In a piece for the Daily Beast Monday, James K. Glassman, former Under Secretary of State in the George W. Bush administration, made an impassioned – and, in our view, logical – case for a separate online national primary contest to choose a single independent candidate to go up against the Republican and Democratic nominees in the three final presidential debates in the fall of 2016.

Phi Beta Iota: Billionaire Peter Ackerman (co-funder with Michael Bloomberg of Americans Elect) has Angus King in mind. King, former Governor and now Senator from Maine, would probably have a photogenic gentlelady — New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand is often mentioned, but a West Coast or Texas option is probably on the table as well — as his proposed running mate. Where this idea fails the smell test is with respect to Congress. Absent an Electoral Reform Act of 2015 that put Independents and small party Members into office — all sworn to NOT caucus with the two-party duopoly — the next President, Independent or not, will just be another pawn. Since the assassination of JFK, and the destruction by Newt Gingrich of Member independence in their voting — Congress has been in constant betrayal of the public trust and failing to respect Article 1 of the Constitution. The idea proposed above is a good one, but insufficient. We should also demand Lee Iacocca’s idea, of a Cabinet named in advance (to which we add the proposal for Cabinet-level debates), and the other 11 elements of the Electoral Reform Act itemized below for the convenience of the reader.